Monday, February 11, 2013

The Green Eyed Monster by Mike Robinson

Since I'm not a very big fan of horror, I rarely read books that creep me out. Well, apart from Andrew Van Wey, who's first book Forsaken kept me up all nigh (in a good way!), who is so good you should check out his books along with this. This book is so scary that I stopped reading it once it got dark.

The Green Eyed Monster revolves around two incredibly talented writers. The book jumps between the present and their childhood/past, slowly unveiling the sinister force behind their talent. The two writers were born on the same day, went to the same school, wrote similar but different works, and had an imaginary grandfather. This is already a little scary, but add in stories (from various points of view) of how people who come in contact with them and their works end up destroying other people and you'll find yourself blasting loud cheery music while knocking on a friend's door to beg for company.

I think this is one of the rare stories where I say it's not about the characters but the plot. And atmosphere. This is a scary book (I was going to say delightfully scary, but that makes it sound like a children's horror movie somehow) and you should read it if you want to scare yourself off the path of being a writer.

But then again, if you read it and continue writing, then you'll know that your need to write is stronger than any mental force that can appear.

The only thing that I was unhappy about was the ending. For some reason, when the force that drove them finally appeared, he wasn't as scary as I imagined. Perhaps it was because I disagreed with his history of time and assessment of the universe (thank you rational part of me), but I think it's because the scare of the unknown grandfather figure (with butterfly metaphor) was so well-written that anything else would have felt anti-climatic.

Perhaps, this is a book you'll buy and read almost to the end. Then, you can sleep in your bed with an open ending. Then again, you might get nightmares (or dreams, depending on how much you like horror).

Disclaimer: I got a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for a free and honest review.

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